F5 BIG IP Network Traffic Firewall Load Balancer

F5 Firewall Introduction & Course Overview

What is F5 Networks?

An American based company that
specializes in Application Delivery Networking (ADN) technology targeting web
applications delivery and security, availability of servers, performance, data
storage devices and cloud resources.

Originally known for its load
balancing products, F5 has diversified into global DNS based load balancing and
acceleration, web application firewalls for security and DDoS defence.

F5 technologies are available
in data centres and cloud platforms such as Microsoft Azure, AWS, Google Cloud
and OpenStack.

F5 Application Delivery Network Products
(BIG-IP)

The BIG-IP family of products
consists of hardware, modularized software and virtual appliances that run the
F5 TMOS operating system.

Depending on the appliance and functionality required, several BIG-IP
modules can be added for your networking tasks. We’ll be focusing on Local
Traffic Manager (LTM) for the purposes of this course.

F5 BIG-IP Product
Offerings

There may be different reasons why a network engineer will be looking F5
appliances. Maybe you want to deploy a device on your network, gain some
knowledge about them or even gain certifications in deploying and administering
the technology. Below are options available:

-
Local Traffic Manager (LTM): Provides local load balancing
based on a full-proxy architecture framework.

-
Application Security Manager (ASM): This works as a web
application firewall.

Certification can become a big
part of an IT engineer’s career once you have experience with technologies.
Begin the journey by visiting F5 website https://f5.com and
register for an account.

Several benefits come with
having an account with F5 from up to date information about new products,
licensing tools, engineering community and most importantly getting access to
virtual F5 BIG-IP applications to install in your home lab to practice the
technologies.

Considering a second hand F5
device could cost about $9000, getting your hands on the virtual machine is an
invaluable option for beginners.

F5 Certification Exam
Structure

Typically
the exam costs $135 to sit and comes in two parts to earn certification as an F5 BIG-IP Administrator;

-101: Application Delivery
Fundamentals
– Covers all the base networking technologies and modules required to configure
optimum performance experience for users interacting with applications on
multiple servers. Knowledge of load balancing of servers using NAT/SNAT,
iRules, persistence and High Availability can be gained from studying this
course.

-201: TMOS
Administration –
Covers the main Traffic Manager Operating System that runs on the F5 device.
This focuses more on how the operating system works, administration,
troubleshooting and maintenance of the F5 BIG – IP system.

Each
exam lasts for 90 minutes with 80 questions to answer. 10 of those questions
carry No marks in completely random orders, so essentially you have to answer
70 questions with the pass mark set at 69% which can be really tight to achieve
unless you have experience playing around with the device.

The
best approach will be to register for an account with F5 where to get the
chance to download a virtual machine version of the load balancer which can be
installed on VMware ESXi for example for training purposes until you are ready
to attempt the exam.

BIG-IP
LTM training courses cost $2,995 (USD) and lasts for a period of 3 days. It’s a
good idea to have a look at the study guides or blueprints to know the nature
of the questions and how to approach them.

You
can only take these exams from VUE Professional Test Centres, locations of
which may not be available near you so it’ll be worth researching these centres
for more information about the exams.

Conclusion & Final Thoughts

We hope
this document sheds some light on what to expect if you are in pursuit of
knowledge or certification in F5 BIG-IP Firewall Load Balancer. Knowledge of
this technology will enable you to deploy networks in corporate environments
with emphasis on balancing the network load for optimum performance of
applications.

Further
certifications exist such as F5 Certified Technology Specialist and F5
Certified Solutions Expert which can be explored after your first stage is
complete.

Do leave
us some comments or tips you may have on passing the exams and thanks for
investing your time with us.

Credits to all organisations and development teams at F5 Networks Technology